Boulevard

Boulevard (pronounced bool-uh-vahrd or boo-luh-vahrd)

(1) A broad avenue in a city, usually with areas at the sides or in the center planted with trees, grass, or flowers, often used as a promenade.

(2) A strip of lawn between a sidewalk (footpath) and the curb (a regionalism from the upper Midwest US & Canada, also called a boulevard strip).

(3) As loosely applied in street names in many cities, usually for wide thoroughfares.

(4) The centre strip of a road dividing traffic travelling in different directions (rare and sometimes applied also to the landscaped sides).

1769: From the French boulevard (broad street or promenade planted with rows of trees), from the Middle French boulevard, bollevart, boulevars, bolevers & bollewerc (promenade, avenue, rampart), either from the Middle High German bolewerc & bolwerc (which endures in modern German as Bollwerk) or the Middle Dutch bolwerc & bollewerc (“bulwark, bastion”), the latter from the Picard, Walloon in the sense of “rampart, avenue built on the site of a razed rampart”, so called because the structures were originally often built on the ruins of old ramparts.  The apparently strange transition from the Middle Dutch bolwerc (wall of a fortification) to the French boulevard, originally (top surface of a military rampart, used as a thoroughfare) is explained by the linguistic tangle of translation, the French language at the time having no “w”, hence the early attempts including boloart, boulever, boloirque & bollvercq.

Lindsay Lohan leaving Boulevard3 nightclub, Los Angeles, 2009.

Although there’s now usually no direct relationship, the idea of boulevards being wider than most streets and with associated landscaping dates from the early promenades being laid out atop demolished city walls, structures which were much wider than the usually narrow urban streets.  The word was adopted in English because there was a frank admiration of the layout of Paris and the Americans picked it up as an obvious differentiation for some of the widest streets of their newer cities although there was sometimes also an element of a wish to emulate European style.  The word is used in many countries with the same French spelling adopted in English although there are variants including the Spanish bulevar and the Turkish bulvar and in Italian the word is sometimes used in the otherwise archaic sense of embankment (a direct inheritance of the sense of “rampart”).  The noun boulevardier dates from 1856 and deconstructed literally means “one who frequents the boulevard”, the implication being ”man-about-town, a city dweller, part of café society”.  Boulevardier was later adopted (also as boulevard cruiser & boulevard car) to describe cars which ape the style of high-speed machines but sacrifice performance for comfort and ease of operation.  In urban cartography & town planning the most common abbreviation is blvd. but bd. & bl. are also used.  Boulevard is a noun and boulevardier is a noun & adjective; the noun plural is boulevards.

The Boulevardier cocktail

Erskine Gwynne (1898-1948) between 1927-1932 was the publisher of Paris Boulevardier, an English-language magazine in the vein of the New Yorker, its market the then quite large colony of Anglo-American expats living in Paris.  While in Paris, Gwynne created a cocktail called the Boulevardier which he suggested was the ideal drink for his readership but it was after it was included in Harry MacElhone’s (1890-1958) book Barflies and Cocktails (1927), that it became popular on both sides of the Atlantic.

Made with whiskey, sweet vermouth and Campari, the Boulevardier is a variation of the classic Negroni, renowned when properly mixed for its deft balance of bitter, boozy and sweet (although some anthologies of cocktails asterisk a proviso that women often prefer them with more vermouth and thus sweeter).  However, while the gin-based Negroni is crisp and refreshing, the whiskey-rich Boulevardier is rich and warming, very much a drink for dark evenings.  Traditionally, it was made with bourbon but there are recipes which use the spicier rye whiskey and, unlike a Negroini where classically the ingredients are in equal parts, a Boulevardier mixes the whiskey in a slightly higher proportion.  It’s served on ice, stirred and garnished with an orange twist.

Ingredients

1 ¼ ounces bourbon whiskey

1 oz Campari

1 oz sweet vermouth

Garnish: orange twist

Instructions

Add bourbon, Campari and sweet vermouth into a mixing glass with ice and stir until well-chilled.  Strain into a rocks glass over fresh ice.  Garnish with an orange twist.

Boulevard cars

1961 Chevrolet Impala SS.

The idea of the “boulevard car” was concocted to describe cars which ape the style of high-speed machines but sacrifice performance for comfort and ease of operation, usually at a lower price; for show rather than go as it were.  Chevrolet actually institutionalized the concept in 1962 with their popular SS (Super Sport) option pack.  The option had first appeared in 1961 and was available for any Impala and although much admired, that Chevrolet that year built close to half a million Impalas and only 453 buyers opted for what was (at US$53.80) the bargain-priced SS package was an indication the marketing needed to be tweaked.  The problem was that Chevrolet had intended the 1961 SS lived up to its name and it was available only with the 348 & 409 cubic inch (5.7 & 6.7 litre) V8s coupled with a robust four-speed manual transmission, combinations which could be quite raucous and were notably thirstier than many were prepared to tolerate.  The dealers noted how buyers were drawn to the style but were put off by the specification which demanded much more from the driver that the smaller-engined models which wafted effortlessly along, automatic transmissions by now the default choice for most Impala buyers.

1967 Chevrolet SS427

Chevrolet’s solution was to become a template for the whole industry which would spend the next decade making, advertising (and, in relatively small numbers, selling) the so-called "muscle cars" which would become so storied.  The muscle-car ecosystem of those years is better documented and more celebrated than any other phase through which Detroit passed yet the numbers of the genuine high performance machines produced was tiny compared to total production of the models upon which they were based.  The experience of 1961 convinced Chevrolet that what most people wanted was not a tyre-melting muscle car (which came with a thirsty, noisy and sometimes cantankerous engine along with what would become prohibitively expensive insurance rates) but one which looked like one.  Thus after 1962 the SS option became widely available and consisted mostly of fancy trim and sporty accessories, able to be ordered with even the most modest engines.  Splitting the market between drag-strip monsters and boulevard cruisers which could be made to look much the same proved a great success.  For some reason though, late in the decade Chevrolet briefly offered the stand-alone SS427 in an Impala body but without the Impala badge while, confusingly, the actual Impala could be ordered with both the SS package and the 427 cubic inch (7.0 litre) V8.  Thus there was the SS427 and the Impala SS 427, the former rather more special and much sought after today.

1958 Mercedes-Benz 300 SL Roadster. 

Manufacturers had been pursuing the concept even before Chevrolet formalized it in the marketing manual.  Even in the interwar years the coincidently named SS cars (which after 1945 become Jaguar) offered essentially the same racy looking machines in a variety of configurations, some of which delivered the performance the lines promised and some did not, the former thought of as genuine sports cars, the latter we would now call boulevard cruisers.  Jaguar considered pursuing the strategy in the early post-war years before deciding sports cars really should all be sporty and although their saloons would come with engines small and large, the roadsters and coupés would be about both show and go.  Mercedes-Benz understood the attraction the 300SL gullwing (W198) had for buyers but knew also it, and the planned roadster version which would be its replacement, were always going to be too expensive for most and that few of them anyway needed a car which could hit what was in the 1950s a most impressive 150 mph (240 km/h).  What they wanted was a stylish machine which recalled the 300SL in which to cruise along wide boulevards.

1955 Mercedes Benz 190 SL.

Thus was crafted the 190 SL (W121; 1955-1963), built on the modest platform of the company’s small, four cylinder saloon rather than the exotic space-frame of the 300 SL.  Eschewed too were costly features like dry-sump lubrication and fuel-injection and the engine was barely more powerful than in the saloon but for a boulevard cruiser that was perfect and over an eight-year run, it out-sold the expensive 300 SL roadster a dozen-fold.  There were plans even for a 220 SL, using the 2.2 litre (134 cubic inch) six cylinder from the “pontoon” saloon and prototypes were built but the continuing success of the 190SL and capacity constraints first postponed and finally doomed the project.  Even this had been an attempt not to create a true sports car but instead make the little roadster cruise the boulevards more smoothly and, in the decades which followed, this indeed was the historic course subsequent generations of the SL would follow.  It would not be until the twenty-first century that the factory would again make an SL for which a racetrack would seem a native environment.

Eristic

Eristic (pronounced e-ris-tik)

(1) Pertaining to controversy or disputation; controversial; provoking strife, controversy or discord.

(2) A person who engages in disputation; a controversialist.

(3) The art of disputation; of, relating, or given to controversy or logical disputation for its own sake (especially if pursued speciously) or as a technical exercise (in education).

(4) In the study of the myths of Antiquity, of or relating to Ἔρις (Eris) (Discord), the goddess of strife,

1630–1640: From the Ancient Greek ἐριστικός (eristikós) (eager for strife, anxious to provoke), the construct being erist(ós) (verbid of erízein (to wrangle), derivative of éris discord) + -ikos, the English equivalent being eris + -t- + ic.  The -ic suffix was from the Middle English -ik, from the Old French -ique, from the Latin -icus, from the primitive Indo-European -kos & -ḱos, formed with the i-stem suffix -i- and the adjectival suffix -kos & -ḱos.  The form existed also in the Ancient Greek as -ικός (-ikós), in Sanskrit as -इक (-ika) and the Old Church Slavonic as -ъкъ (-ŭkŭ); A doublet of -y.  In European languages, adding -kos to noun stems carried the meaning "characteristic of, like, typical, pertaining to" while on adjectival stems it acted emphatically; in English it's always been used to form adjectives from nouns with the meaning “of or pertaining to”.  A precise technical use exists in physical chemistry where it's used to denote certain chemical compounds in which a specified chemical element has a higher oxidation number than in the equivalent compound whose name ends in the suffix -ous; (eg sulphuric acid (H₂SO₄) has more oxygen atoms per molecule than sulphurous acid (H₂SO₃).  Eristic is a noun & adjective, eristical is an adjectives and eristically is an adverb; the noun plural is eristics.

The eristic is a long-standing feature in democratic politics where the formal notions of “government” and “opposition” are institutionalized.  There is much in Lord Randolph Churchill’s (1849–1895) dictum that “the duty of the opposition is to oppose” and that process is the dynamic by which political debate is conducted.  That’s good if a genuine contest of ideas but there is often a sense that things are opposed for no reason other purpose than the conflict itself; it’s not the goal which matters, just the maintenance of strife.  The state of politics in the US can now be said to be eristic and that’s not something unique to the modern era, politics is a cyclical business and the forces unleashed can ultimately create conditions whereby conflict switches to conciliation and then to consensus.  Although there seems little hope of that in the immediate future, nothing lasts forever and unexpected events can be catalytic.  Eristic seems an attractive option for those writing about politics because (1) it’s undeniably applicable and (2) it adds variety to what can be often a repetitive vocabulary, the most common adjectives in such texts including belligerent, combative, contentious, controversial, disputatious, quarrelsome, scrappy & testy.  Political scientists who decide to use the adjective should note the comparative form (more eristic) and the superlative (most eristic) and, just in case there’s any doubt, Donald Trump (b 1946; US president 2017-2021) would likely usually attract the superlative.

One of the (many) judgments of Paris: Early in the century, the feud between Paris Hilton and Lindsay Lohan played out in the well-documented way such things are done on social media.  Both now mothers, détente appears to have been negotiated and a state of peaceful co-existence seems now to prevail.

In Greek mythology, Ἔρις (Eris) (strife) was the goddess or personified spirit (daimona) of strife, discord, contention and rivalry and in the bloodthirsty way artists for centuries delighted in doing, often she was depicted as the daimona of the strife of war, haunting battlefields and glorying in the carnage of the slaughter.  Something of the crooked Hillary Clinton on Antiquity, for obvious reasons Eris was closely identified with the Enyo the goddess of war and the eighth century poet of Ancient Greek Homer used the names interchangeably in his epic poems the Iliad and the Odyssey.  In Roman mythology her name was Discordia, the source obviously of the Modern English “discord”.  So disagreeable was Eris that other gods tried to avoid inviting her to their parties.  Usually this caused no more than the usual bitchiness familiar in mythology but one infamous non-invite led to the event known as the μῆλον τῆς Ἔριδος (Golden Apple of Discord), known in the story The Judgment of Paris.  Much miffed at not being invited to the wedding of Peleus & Thetis, Eris tossed the golden apple in the midst of the feast of the gods at the wedding banquet, offering it as a prize to whoever was of the greatest beauty, thus sparking a vanity-fueled dispute among Hera, Athena and Aphrodite a squabble which ultimately triggered the Trojan War.  Eris, even more angry than usual, had inscribed kallisti (To the prettiest one) on her “wedding gift” handing it to Πάρις (Paris, AKA Ἀλέξανδρος (Aléxandros) (Alexander), the son of King Priam and Queen Hecuba of Troy) who was told to choose the goddess he found most beautiful.  Judging what turned out to be one of Greek mythology's more significant beauty contests, Paris chose Aphrodite, offending Hera and Athena, the most famous consequence of their feud being the Trojan War.  Tragedy did thereafter stalk the marriage of Peleus and Thetis; of their seven sons, the only one to survive beyond infancy was Achilles.

Friedrich Nietzsche (circa 1890), etching on wove paper by an unknown artist of the European Expressionist school, Robert Gore Rifkind Center for German Expressionist Studies, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Wilshire Boulevard, Los Angeles.  Even before he went mad, Nietzsche looked sort of deranged.

Eris wasn’t an accident of supernatural genetics but was “born that way”.  In his Theogony, the Ancient Greek poet of the seventh & eighth centuries, Hesiod, recounted how she was the goddess who gave birth to work, forgetfulness, hunger, pain, battles, fights, murders, killings, quarrels, lies, disputes, lawlessness, ruin and bad language, but spread the blame a bit in his later Works and Days, saying the source of conflict on Earth was the two different strifes: Eris the daughter of Nyx and the other a spirit of emulation, placed by Zeus within the world to engender a healthy sense of competition.  That much appealed to the German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) who decided “a healthy sense of competition” was the struggle for survival and supremacy between men which was the very nature of human existence and in Homer's Contest (circa 1872 and described as a preface for one of several projected or at least contemplated books) he wrote: “Without competing ambition the Hellenic State like the Hellenic man degenerates.  He becomes bad and cruel, thirsting for revenge, and godless; in short, he becomes “pre-Homeric” — and then it needs only a panic in order to bring about his fall and to crush him.”  Contemplating the Germany of the Weimar Republic (1918-1933), Adolf Hitler (1889-1945; Führer (leader) and German head of government 1933-1945 & head of state 1934-1945) quickly grasped Nietzsche and was soon seduced by his words.

Hitler’s opinion of his fellow man was often not high and Nietzsche’s construct of human nature resonated.  He thought envy and jealousy the foundation of Ancient Greek society, both qualities essential for effective competition to produce the dynamic in which the strong would thrive and dominate the weak: “Eris urges even the unskilled man to work, and if one who lacks property beholds another who is rich, then he hastens to sow in similar fashion and to plant and to put his house in order; the neighbor vies with the neighbor who strives after fortune.. The potter also has a grudge against the potter, and the carpenter against the carpenter; the beggar envies the beggar, and the singer the singer. Good is this Eris to men”.  More delicate types like the English historian Arnold Toynbee (1889–1975 and born a week before Hitler) saw something very different in Hellenic civilization but for Nietzsche the lesson was conflict (competition) in all facets of life, be it athletics, art, war, rhetoric or poetry meant not only individuals reaping the material and spiritual rewards of fame & glory but the strengthening of a whole society.  Nietzsche may not have been the “Nazi” some like to suggest but his words had such appeal to them it can be hard to separate the two and the implications of his philosophy are apparent in Hitler’s domestic & foreign policy as well as the internal structures of the party, something not well understood until the post-war years.

Beetle

Beetle (pronounced beet-l)

(1) Any of numerous insects of the order Coleoptera, having biting mouthparts and characterized by hard, horny forewings modified to form shell-like protective elytra forewings that cover and protect the membranous flight wings.

(2) Used loosely, any of various insects resembling true beetles.

(3) A game of chance in which players attempt to complete a drawing of a beetle, different dice rolls allowing them to add the various body parts.

(4) A heavy hammering or ramming instrument, usually of wood, used to drive wedges, force down paving stones, compress loose earth etc.

(5) A machine in which fabrics are subjected to a hammering process while passing over rollers, as in cotton mills; used to finish cloth and other fabrics, they’re known also as a “beetling machine”

(6) To use a beetle on; to drive, ram, beat or crush with a beetle; to finish cloth or other fabrics with a beetling machine.

(7) In slang, quickly to move; to scurry (mostly UK), used also in the form “beetle off”.

(8) Something projecting, jutting out or overhanging (used to describe geological formation and, in human physiology, often in the form beetle browed).

(9) By extension, literally or figuratively, to hang or tower over someone in a threatening or menacing manner.

(10) In slang, the original Volkswagen and the later retro-model, based on the resemblance (in silhouette) of the car to the insect; used with and without an initial capital; the alternative slang “bug” was also analogous with descriptions of the insects.

Pre 900: From the late Middle English bittil, bitil, betylle & bityl, from the Old English  bitula, bitela, bītel & bīetel (beetle (and apparently originally meaning “little biter; biting insect”)), from bēatan (to beat) (and related to bitela, bitel & betl, from bītan (to bite) & bitol (teeth)), from the Proto-West Germanic bitilō & bītil, from the Proto-Germanic bitilô & bītilaz (that which tends to bite, biter, beetle), the construct being bite +‎ -le.  Bite was from the Middle English biten, from the Old English bītan (bite), from the Proto-West Germanic bītan, from the Proto-Germanic bītaną (bite), from the primitive Indo-European bheyd- (split) and the -le suffix was from the Middle English -elen, -len & -lien, from the Old English -lian (the frequentative verbal suffix), from the Proto-Germanic -lōną (the frequentative verbal suffix) and was cognate with the West Frisian -elje, the Dutch -elen, the German -eln, the Danish -le, the Swedish -la and the Icelandic -la.  It was used as a frequentative suffix of verbs, indicating repetition or continuousness.  The forms in Old English were cognate with the Old High German bicco (beetle), the Danish bille (beetle), the Icelandic bitil & bitul (a bite, bit) and the Faroese bitil (small piece, bittock).

In architecture, what was historically was the "beetle brow" window is now usually called "the eyebrow".  A classic example of a beetle-brow was that of Rudolf Hess (1894–1987; Nazi deputy führer 1933-1941).  

Beetle in the sense of the tool used to work wood, stonework, fabric etc also dates from before 900 and was from the Middle English betel & bitille (mallet, hammer), from the Old English bītel, bētel & bȳtel which was cognate with the Middle Low German bētel (chisel), from bēatan & bētan (beat) and related to the Old Norse beytill (penis).  The adjectival sense applied originally to human physiology (as beetle-browed) and later extended to geological formations (as a back-formation of beetle-browed) and architecture where it survives as the “eyebrow” window constructions mounted in sloping roofs.  The mid-fourteenth century Middle English bitelbrouwed (grim-browed, sullen (literally “beetle-browed”)) is thought to have been an allusion to the many beetles with bushy antennae, the construct being the early thirteenth century bitel (in the sense of "sharp-edged, sharp" which was probably a compound from the Old English bitol (biting, sharp) + brow, which in Middle English meant "eyebrow" rather than "forehead."  Although the history of use in distant oral traditions is of course murky, it may be from there that the Shakespearean back-formation (from Hamlet (1602)) in the sense of "project, overhang" was coined, perhaps from bitelbrouwed.  As applied to geological formations, the meaning “dangerously to overhang cliffs etc” dates from circa 1600.   The alternative spellings bittle, betel & bittil are all long obsolete.  Beetle is a noun & verb & adjective, beetled is a verb, beetling is a verb & adjective and beetler is a noun; the noun plural is beetles.

The Beetle (Volkswagen Type 1)

First built before World War II (1939-1945), the Volkswagen (the construct being volks (people) + wagen (car)) car didn’t pick up the nickname “beetle” until 1946, the allied occupation forces translating it from the German Käfer and it caught on, lasting until the last one left a factory in Mexico in 2003 although in different places it gained other monikers, the Americans during the 1950s liking “bug” and the French coccinelle (ladybug) and as sales gathered strength around the planet, there were literally dozens of local variations, the more visually memorable including: including: bintus (Tortoise) in Nigeria, pulga (flea) in Colombia, ඉබ්බා (tortoise) in Sri Lanka, sapito (little toad) in Perú, peta (turtle) in Bolivia, folcika (bug) in Bosnia and Herzegovina, kostenurka (turtle) in Bulgaria, baratinha (little cockroach) in Cape Verde, poncho in Chile and Venezuela. buba (bug) in Croatia, boblen (the bubble), asfaltboblen (the asphalt bubble), gravid rulleskøjte (pregnant rollerskate) & Hitlerslæden (Hitler-sled) in Denmark. cepillo (brush) in the Dominican Republic, fakrouna (tortoise) in Libya, kupla (bubble) & Aatun kosto (Adi's revenge) in Finland, cucaracha (cockroach) in Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras, Kodok (frog) in Indonesia, ghoorbaghei (قورباغه ای) (frog) in Iran, agroga عكروكة (little frog) & rag-gah ركـّة (little turtle) in Iraq, maggiolino (maybug) in Italy, kodok (frog) in Malaysia, pulguita (little flea) in Mexico and much of Latin America, boble (bubble) in Norway, kotseng kuba (hunchback car) & boks (tin can) in the Philippines, garbus (hunchback) in Poland, mwendo wa kobe (tortoise speed) in Swahili and banju maqlub (literally “upside down bathtub”) in Malta.

A ground beetle (left), a first generation der Käfer (the Beetle, 1939-2003) (centre) and an "New Beetle" (1997-2011).  Despite the appearance, the "New Beetle" was of front engine & front-wheel-drive configuration, essentially a re-bodied Volkswagen Golf.  The new car was sold purely as a retro, the price paid for the style, certain packaging inefficiencies. 

A handy (and potentially life-saving) accessory for wartime KdF-Wagens was a passenger-side mount for a MP 40/41 Maschinenpistole (submachine gun), usually dubbed the Schmeisser by Allied troops on the basis German weapons designer Hugo Schmeisser (1884–1953) was responsible for the earlier and visually similar MP 18 (the world’s first mass-produced submachine gun).  Although he was not involved in the development of the MP 40, that weapon did use a magazine produced in accordance with one of his patents.

The Beetle (technically, originally the KdF-Wagen and later the Volkswagen Type 1) was one of the products nominally associated with the Nazi regime’s Gemeinschaft Kraft durch Freude (KdF, “Strength Through Joy”), the state-controlled organization which was under the auspices of the Deutsche Arbeitsfront (German Labor Front) which replaced the independent labor unions.  Operating medical services, cruise liners and holiday resorts for the working class, the KdF envisaged the Volkswagen as a European Model T Ford in that it would be available in sufficient numbers and at a price affordable by the working man, something made easier still by the Sparkarte (savings booklet) plan under which a deposit would be paid with the balance to be met in instalments.  Once fully paid, a Volkswagen would be delivered.  All this was announced in 1939 but the war meant that not one Volkswagen was ever delivered to any of those who diligently continued to make their payments as late as 1943.  Whether, even without a war, the scheme could have continued with the price set at a politically sensitive 990 Reichsmarks is uncertain.  That was certainly below the cost of production and although the Ford Model T had demonstrated how radically production costs could be lowered once the efficiencies of mass-production reached critical mass, there were features unique to the US economy which may never have manifested in the Nazi system, even under sustained peace although, had the Nazis won the war, from the Atlantic to the Urals they'd have had a vast pool of slave labor, a obvious way to reduce unit labor costs.  As it was, it wasn’t until 1964 that some of the participants in the Sparkarte were granted a settlement under which they received a discount (between 9-14%) which could be credited against a new Beetle.  Inflation and the conversion in 1948 from Reichsmark to Deutschmark make it difficult accurately to assess the justice of that but the consensus was Volkswagen got a good deal.  The settlement was also limited, nobody resident in the GDR (The German Democratic Republic, the old East Germany (1949-1990)) or elsewhere behind the iron curtain received even a Reichspfennig (cent).

Herbie, the love bug

Lindsay Lohan (left) among the Beetles (centre) on the red carpet for the Los Angeles premiere of Herbie Fully Loaded (2005), El Capitan Theater, Hollywood, Los Angeles, 19 June 19, 2005.  The Beetle (right) was one of the many replica “Herbies” in attendance and, on the day, Ms Lohan (using the celebrity-endorsed black Sharpie) autographed the glove-box lid, removed for the purpose.

In a Beetle it’s a simple task quickly to remove and re-fit a lid but unfortunately it was upside down when signed.  Autographs on glove-box lids (and other parts) are a thing and the most famous (and numerous) are those of Carroll Shelby (1923–2012) on Shelby American AC Cobras and Mustangs.  Many are authentic because for a donation to the Shelby foundation (typically around US$250) an owner could send to Shelby American headquarters in California a lid with a SSAE (stamped, self-addressed envelope) and it would come back duly signed and with a letter of authenticity (though one owner noted dryly the felt pen (silver ink) he’d enclosed wasn’t returned.  There are many slight variations in the signatures which hints they were done by hand and not an auto-pen although those that differ most are the ones signed while the lid was fixed to the car; for most it’s an unnatural action to sign on other than a flat, horizontal surface.  There are also some of questionable provenance, not all of which are one Cobra replicas built long after Carroll Shelby’s death and “Carroll Shelby glove-box signature vinyl transfer tapes” are available on-line in black, white and silver for as little as US$6.00.  Beware of imitations one might say but given there are over 50,000 “imitation” Cobras against a thousand-odd originals, the fake signature industry is sort of in the same spirit.

One of the cars used in the track racing sequences, now on display in the Peterson Automotive Museum on Wilshire Boulevard, Los Angeles, California (left), a Disney Pictures promotional image (centre) and a Herbie “replica” (with glove-box lid signed by Lindsay Lohan) built on a modified 1964 Beetle (right).

Before the release in 2005 of Herbie: Fully Loaded, following the first "Herbie" film (The Love Bug (1968)), there had been three sequels and a television series so the ecosystem of Herbie replicas (clones, tributes etc) was well-populated and as a promotional gimmick Disney Pictures invited fans to bring their replicas to line the red carpet at the Los Angeles premiere.  Producing a “true” Herbie replica is technically possible but not all will be the same because even within each film there were variations in the appearance because a number of Beetles were required for the filming with not all identical in every visual aspect.  In post-production, there is a “continuity editor” who is tasked with removing or disguising such inconsistencies but minor details, especially if not in any way significant, often slip through something which delights the film obsessives who curate sites documenting the “errors”.  Among Beetle (especially the pre 1968 models) collectors there’s a faction of originality police (as uncompromising as any found in the communities patrolling vintage Ferraris, Corvettes, Jaguars, Porsches and such) and when the Herbie “replica” (above right) was offered for sale (as a “Herbie-Style 1964 Volkswagen Beetle Sunroof Sedan”) they were there to pounce, noting:

(1) The last year for the Golde folding sunroof was 1963, 1964 Sunroof Sedans fitted with a steel, sliding-roof.  The consensus was either the roof from an earlier Sunroof Sedan was spliced on or a hole was cut for salvaged Golde assembly to be installed.  Neither would be technically difficult for someone with the parts and skill but an inspection would be required to know which and on the basis of the photographs the work had been done well.

(2) The hood (“bonnet” over the frunk) was from an earlier model (with a pre-1963 Wolfsburg crest).

(3) The licence plate light was from 1963 (the updated engine and conversion to 12-volt electrics (both common in early Beetles) were disclosed in the sales blurb).

(4) The radio antenna was on the driver’s side whereas in the film it appears on the passenger’s side and there were many detail differences (decals and such) but there were inconsistencies also in the film.

Professor Porsche

There were many Volkswagens produced during the war but all were delivered either to the military or the Nazi Party organization where they were part of the widespread corruption endemic to the Third Reich, the extent of which wasn’t understood until well after the demise of the regime.  The wartime models were starkly utilitarian and this continued between 1945-1947 when production resumed to supply the needs of the Allied occupying forces, the bulk of the output being taken up by the British Army, the Wolfsburg factory being in the British zone.  As was the practice immediately after the war, the plan had been to ship the tooling to the UK and begin production there but the UK manufacturers, after inspecting the vehicle, pronounced it wholly unsuitable for civilian purposes and too primitive to appeal to customers.  Accordingly, the factory remained in Germany and civilian deliveries began in 1947, initially only in the home market but within a few years, export sales were growing and by the mid-1950s, the Beetle was a success even in the US market, something which must have seem improbable in 1949 when two were sold.  The platform proved adaptable too, the original two-door saloon and cabriolet augmented by a van on a modified chassis which was eventually built in a bewildering array of body styles (and made famous as the Kombi and Microbus (Type 2) models which became cult machines of the 1960s counter-culture) and the stylish, low-slung Karmann-Ghia (the classic Type 14 and the later Type 34 & Type 145 (Brazil), sold as a 2+2 coupé and convertible.  Later there would be attempts to use more modern body styling while preserving the mechanical layout (the Type 3, 1961-1973 and Type 4 (411/412), 1968-1974) but the approach was by the early 1970s understood to be a dead end although the concept was until 1982 pursued by Volkswagen's Brazilian operation. 

Herr Professor Ferdinand Porsche (1875–1951) explaining the Beetle to Adolf Hitler (1889-1945; Führer (leader) and German head of government 1933-1945 & head of state 1934-1945) during the ceremony marking the laying of the foundation stone at the site of the Volkswagen factory, Fallersleben, Wolfsburg in Germany's Lower Saxony region, 26 May 1938 (which Christians mark as the Solemnity of the Ascension of Jesus Christ, commemorating the bodily Ascension of Christ to Heaven) (left).  The visit would have been a pleasant diversion for Hitler who was at the time immersed in the planning for the Nazi's takeover of Czechoslovakia and later the same day, during a secret meeting, the professor would display a scale-model of an upcoming high-performance version (right). 

The Beetle also begat what are regarded as the classic Porsches (the 356 (1948-1965), the 911 (1964-1998) and 912 (1965-1969 & 1976)).  Although documents filed in court over the years would prove Ferdinand Porsche’s (1875-1951) involvement in the design of the Beetle revealed not quite the originality of thought that long was the stuff of legend (as a subsequent financial settlement acknowledged), he was attached to the concept and for reasons of economic necessity alone, the salient features of the Beetle (the separate platform, the air-cooled flat engine, rear wheel drive and the basic shape) were transferred to the early post-war Porsches and while for many reasons features like liquid cooling later had to be adopted, the basic concept of the 1938 KdF-Wagen is still identifiable in today’s 911s.

The Beetle had many virtues as might be surmised given it was in more-or-less continuous production for sixty-five years during which over 20 million were made.  However, one common complaint was the lack of power, something which became more apparent as the years went by and average highway speeds rose.  The factory gradually increased both displacement & power and an after-market industry arose to supply those who wanted more, the results ranging from mild to wild.  One of the most dramatic approaches was that taken in 1969 by Emerson Fittipaldi (b 1946) who would later twice win both the Formula One World Championship and the Indianapolis 500.

The Fittipaldi 3200

Team Fittipaldi in late 1969 entered the Rio 1000 km race at the Jacarepagua circuit, intending to run a prototype with an Alfa Romeo engine but after suffering delays in the fabrication of some parts, it was clear there would be insufficient time to prepare the car.  No other competitive machine was immediately available so the decision was taken to improvise and build a twin-engined Volkswagen Beetle, both car and engines in ample supply, local production having begun in 1953.  On paper, the leading opposition (Alfa Romeo T33s, a Ford GT40 and a Lola T70 was formidable but the Beetle, with two tuned 1600 cm³ (98 cubic inch) engines, would generate some 400 horsepower in a car weighing a mere 407kg (897 lb) car.  Expectations weren't high and other teams were dismissive of the threat yet in qualifying, the Beetle set the second fastest time and in the race proved competitive, running for some time second to the leading Alfa Romeo T33 until a broken gearbox forced retirement.

Fittipaldi 3200, Interlagos, 1969.  The car competed on Pirelli CN87 Cinturatos (which were for street rather than race-track use) tyres which was an interesting choice but gearbox failures meant it never raced long enough for their durability to be determined.

The idea of twin-engined cars was nothing new, Enzo Ferrari (1898-1988) in 1935 having entered the Alfa Romeo Bimotor in the Grand Prix held on the faster circuits.  At the time a quick solution to counter the revolutionary new Mercedes-Benz and Auto-Union race cars, the Bimotor had one supercharged straight-eight mounted at each end, both providing power to the rear wheels.  It was certainly fast, timed at 335 km/h (208 mph) in trials and on the circuits it could match anything in straight-line speed but its Achilles heel was that which has beset most twin-engined racing cars, high fuel consumption & tyre wear and a tendency to break drive-train components.  There were some successful adoptions when less powerful engines were used and the goal was traction rather than outright speed (such as the Citroën 2CV Sahara (694 of which were built between 1958-1971)) but usually there were easier ways to achieve the same thing.  Accordingly, while the multi-engine idea proved effective (indeed sometimes essential) when nothing but straight line speed was demanded (such as land-speed record (LSR) attempts or drag-racing), in events when corners needed to be negotiated, it proved a cul-de-sac.  There was certainly potential as the handful of "Twinis" (twin-engined versions of the BMC (British Motor Corporation) Mini (1959-2000) built in the 1960s demonstrated.  The original Twini had been built by constructor John Cooper (1923–2000 and associated with the Mini Cooper) after he'd observed a twin-engined Mini-Moke (a utilitarian vehicle based on the Mini's platform) being tested for the military.  Cooper's Twini worked and was rapid but after being wrecked in an accident (not directly related to the novel configuration), the project was abandoned.   

Still, in 1969, Team Fittipaldi had nothing faster available and while on paper, the bastard Beetle seemed unsuited to the task as the Jacarepagua circuit then was much twistier than it would become, it would certainly have a more than competitive  power to weight ratio, the low mass likely to make tyre wear less of a problem.  According to Brazilian legend, in the spirit of the Q&D (quick & dirty) spirit of the machines hurried assembly, after some quick calculations on a slide-rule, the design process moved rapidly from the backs of envelopes to paper napkins at the Churrascaria Interlagos Brazilian Barbecue House where steaks and red wine were ordered.  Returning to the workshop, most of the chassis was fabricated against chalk-marks on garage floor while the intricate linkages required to ensure the fuel-flow to the four Weber DC045 carburetors were constructed using cigarette packets as templates to maintain the correct distance between components.  In the race, the linkages performed faultlessly.

Fittipaldi 3200: The re-configuration of the chassis essentially transformed the rear-engined Beetle into a mid-engined car, the engines between the driver and the rear-axle line, behind which sat the transaxle.  

The chassis used a standard VW platform, cut just behind the driver’s seat where a tubular sub-frame was attached.  The front suspension and steering was retained although larger Porsche drum brakes were used in deference to the higher speeds which would be attained.  Remarkably, Beetle type swing axles were used at the rear which sounds frightening but these had the advantage of providing much negative camber and on the smooth and predictable surface of a race-track, especially in the hands of a race-driver, their behavior would not be as disconcerting as their reputation might suggest.  Two standard 1600cm³ Beetle engines (thus the 3200 designation) were fitted for the shake down tests and once the proof-of-concept had been verified, they were sent for tuning, high-performance Porsche parts used and the displacement of each increased to 2200cm³ (134 cubic inch).  The engines proved powerful but too much for the bottom end, actually breaking a crankshaft (a reasonable achievement) so the stroke was shortened, yielding a final displacement only slightly greater than the original specification while maintaining the ability to sustain higher engine speeds.

Fittipaldi 3200 (1969) schematic (left) and Porsche 908/01 LH Coupé (1968–1969) (right): The 3200's concept of a mid-engined, air-cooled, flat-eight coupe was essentially the same as the Porsche 908 but the Fittipaldi 3200's added features included drum brakes, swing axles and a driver's seat which doubled as the fuel tank.  There might have been some drivers of the early (and lethal) Porsche 917s who would have declined an offer to race the 3200, thinking it "too dangerous".

The rear engine was attached in a conventional arrangement through a Porsche five-speed transaxle although first gear was blanked-off (shades of the British trick of the 1950s which discarded the "stump-puller" first gear to create a "close ratio" three-speed box) because of a noted proclivity for stripping the cogs while the front engine was connected to the rear by a rubber joint with the crank phased at 90^o to the rear so the power sequenced correctly.  Twin oil coolers were mounted in the front bumper while the air-cooling was also enhanced, the windscreen angled more acutely to create at the top an aperture through which air could be ducted via flexible channels in the roof.   Most interesting however was the fuel tank.  To satisfy the thirst of the two engines, the 3200 carried 100 litres (26.4 (US) / 22 (Imperial) gallons) of a volatile ethanol cocktail in an aluminum tank which was custom built to fit car: It formed the driver’s seat!

Incongruity: The Beetle and the prototypes, Interlagos, 1969 

In the Rio de Janeiro 1000 kilometre race on the Guanabara circuit, the 3200, qualified 2^nd and ran strongly in the race, running as high as second, the sight of a Beetle holding off illustrious machinery such as a Porsche special, a Lola-Chevrolet R70, and a Ford GT40, one of motorsport’s less expected sights.  Unfortunately, in the twin-engined tradition, it proved fast but fragile, retiring with gearbox failure before half an hour had elapsed.  It raced once more but proved no more reliable.

How to have fun with a Beetle.

Caffeine addiction is one of humanity’s most widespread vices and it extends to those driving cars.  In famous tort case, Stella Liebeck v. McDonald's Restaurants, P.T.S., Inc. and McDonald's International, Inc (1994 Extra LEXIS 23 (Bernalillo County, N.M. Dist. Ct. 1994), 1995 WL 360309 (Bernalillo County, N.M. Dist. Ct. 1994), a passenger in a car (a 1989 model with no cup holders) received severe burns from spilled coffee, just purchased from a McDonald’s drive-through.  Although the matter received much publicity on the basis it was absurd to be able to sue for being burned by spilling what was known by all to be “hot” and the case came to be cited as an example of “frivolous” litigation, there were technical reasons why some liability should have been ascribed to McDonalds.  The jury awarded some US$2.6 million in damages although this was, on appeal, reduced to US640,000 and the matter was settled out of court before a further appeal.

How to have coffee in a Beetle

Hertella Auto Kaffeemachine, 1959.

In the twenty-first century, some now judge cars on the basis of the count, capacity & convenience of its cup-holders but in the less regulated environment of the FRG (Federal Republic of Germany, the old West Germany, 1949-1990) of 1959, one company anticipated the future trend by offering a dashboard-mounted coffee maker for the Volkswagen Beetle.  The Hertella Auto Kaffeemachine was not a success, presumably because even those not familiar with Sir Isaac Newton's (1642–1727) First Law of Motion (known also as the Law of Inertia: “An object at rest will remain at rest, and an object in motion will continue in motion with the same speed and in the same direction unless acted upon by an unbalanced external force”) could visualise the odd WCS (worst case scenario).

A happy caffeine addict, pouring himself a cup of coffee in his VW Beetle.

That it was in 1959 available in 6v & 12v versions is an indication Hertella may have envisaged a wider market because VW didn’t offer a 12v system as an option until 1963 and the company seems to have given some thought to Newtonian physics, the supplied porcelain cups fitted at the base with a disc of magnetic metal which provided some resistance to movement although the liquid obviously moved as the forces were applied.  The apparatus was mounted with a detachable bracket, permitting the pot to be removed for cleaning.  The quality of the coffee was probably not outstanding because there’s no percolation; the coffee added in a double-layer screen and “brewed” on much the same basis as one would tea-leaves and for those who value quality, a thermos-flask would have been a better choice but there would have been caffeine addicts willing to try the device.  The trouble was there clearly weren’t many of them and even in the FRG of the Wirtschaftswunder (the post war “economic miracle”) the fairly high price would have deterred many although now, one in perfect condition (especially if accompanied by the precious documents or packaging) would command a price well over US$1000.

How to advertise a Beetle

Although the popular perception of motoring in the US during the 1960s is it was all about gas-guzzling behemoths and tyre-smoking muscle cars no less thirsty, Detroit’s advertising did not neglect to mention fuel economy and the engineers always had in the range a combination of power-train and gearing options for those for whom that was important; it was a significant if unsexy market.  However, the advertising for domestic vehicles, whatever the segment, almost always emphasised virtues like attractiveness and, in the era of annual product updates, made much of things being “new”.  Volkswagen took a different approach, centred around the “Think Small” campaign, created by the advertising agency Doyle Dane Bernbach (DDB).  Positioning VW Beetle ownership as a kind of inverted snobbery, the campaign embraced simplicity and honesty, quite a contrast with the exaggerations common at the time.  The technique was ground-breaking and its influences have been seen in the decades since.

The key theme was one of self-deprecating humor which took the criticisms of the car (quirky, small, ugly, lacking luxuries) and made a headline of them, emphasising instead attributes such as reliability, fuel efficiency, and affordability, all done with some wry observations.  Whether making a virtue of the by then dubious qualities of swing axles (centre right) convinced many is uncertain but the "Why are the wheels crooked" one dates from 1962, some three years before the publication of Ralph Nadar's (b 1934) Unsafe at Any Speed (1965) in which a chapter was devoted to the troubling behavior swing axles induced in the Chevrolet Corvair (1960-1969).  Still, the focus on authenticity had real appeal in a consumerist age when agencies produced elaborate graphics and full-color photographs taken in exotic locations: VW’s monochromatic look was emblematic of the machine being advertised, one which in 1969 still looked almost identical to one from 1959.  A key to the success of the campaign was the template: most of the upper part of the page usually a single image of a Beetle, a caption beneath and then the explanatory text.

Spoof in National Lampoon's Encyclopedia of Humor (1973).

The US magazine National Lampoon (1970-1998) ran a parody in the style of VW’s campaign in their Encyclopedia of Humor (1973).  The "If Ted Kennedy drove a Volkswagen, he'd be President today" piece not only borrowed the template but also reprised VW’s claim of “watertight construction” which had appeared in one of the manufacturer’s genuine advertisments.  Although what the magazine did was protected under the constitution’s first amendment (freedom of speech; freedom of the press) other legal remedies beckoned and Volkswagen filed suit claiming (1) violations of copyright and their trademark and (2) defamation.  Apparently, a number of those who had seen the spoof believed it to be real and the company was receiving feedback from the outraged vowing never to buy another VW, a reaction familiar at scale in the age of X (formerly known as Twitter) but which then required writing a letter, putting it in an envelope, affixing a postage stamp and dropping it in the mailbox.  So pile-ons happened then but they took longer to form.  In a settlement, National Lampoon undertook to (1) withdraw all unsold copies of the 450,000 print run (2) destroy the piece’s hot plate (in pre-digital printing, a physical “plate” was created onto which ink was laid to create the printed copy) and (3) publish in the next issue Volkswagen's explanatory disclaimer of involvement.  National Lampoon was also estopped from using the spoof for any subsequent purpose.

The 1967 Oldsmobile Delmont 88 which Ted Kennedy crashed into the water under Dike Bridge Chappaquiddick Island, Massachusetts.

The Oldsmobile belonged to Kennedy's mother, despite old Joe Kennedy (1888–1969) once having asserted "The Kennedys drive Buicks!".  By the time Mary Jo Kopechne died, the company had already retired the Delmont nameplate after a two-year run.

The notorious incident the parody referenced was the “Chappaquiddick Incident” in which Ted Kennedy (1932–2009) drove off a bridge, shortly before midnight on 18 July 1969, after the then senator had left a cocktail party in the company of Miss Mary Jo Kopechne (1940-1969) who had worked on Robert F Kennedy’s (RFK, 1925–1968; US attorney general 1961-1964) presidential campaign in 1968.  Miss Kopechne died in the crash, Senator Kennedy not reporting the matter for more than ten hours after he left the scene.  Kennedy received a two month, suspended sentence for leaving the scene of an accident but while his political career continued for decades, he never succeeded in his attempts to become president and his conduct in the Chappaquiddick Incident contributed to that although as one notorious interview in 1979 revealed, apart from his sense of entitlement, he could disclose no good reason why he should be POTUS.

Volkswagen's genuine "watertight construction" advertisment which inspired National Lampoon.  It was one of the few in the series to be run in color and that was because water really didn't look like "water" in monochrome.

Years after the Chappaquiddick Incident, when Ted was only of the brothers left alive, in an interview, Richard Nixon (1913-1994; US president 1969-1974) compared the three , pronouncing Ted the best and most natural politician while Robert was driven and intense, “like a seventeenth century Jesuit priest”, a phrase he attributed to Theodore Roosevelt’s (TR, 1858–1919; US president 1901-1909) daughter Alice Lee Roosevelt Longworth (1884–1980).  John Kennedy (JFK, 1917–1963; US president 1961-1963) he thought “quite a shy person” for whom the public aspect of politics was “an effort”, albeit one he performed very well.  Nixon was a flawed character but in his (enforced) retirement, he was a fair judge of the politicians he knew.